


Medium-Sized and Persistent

by bethagain



Category: Star Wars Original Trilogy
Genre: Adventure, Fluff, Gen, Humor, I don't know I just know it's got Luke Skywalker and space bears, Space Bears, persistent space bears
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-12
Updated: 2017-05-12
Packaged: 2018-10-30 21:46:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 995
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10885557
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bethagain/pseuds/bethagain
Summary: Luke and his student Andra are on a mission to retrieve some Jedi artifacts from a long-forgotten museum.They were expecting a quick, uneventful trip.They were not expecting Space Bears.





	Medium-Sized and Persistent

**Author's Note:**

> This is one of those things that happens when I'm tired and not feeling well and just want to write a story.
> 
> Unbeta'd, minimally edited, but what the heck it made me laugh.
> 
> Thank you to iphysnikephoros and silveronthetree for the prompts!

Space bears are persistent.

Luke doesn’t know their actual name, so “space bears” will have to do. They’re medium-sized, furry, four-legged creatures and they’re trying to get through the door. 

They’re making growling noises.

Luke can see teeth.

Andra’s beside him, blaster out. Luke’s got his lightsaber in his right hand but he hasn’t ignited it yet. So far, the space bears have only managed to shove the heavy sliding door a few centimeters along its track. They’re pushing their snouts through, pointed teeth gnawing at the door and the frame. 

There are many snouts. The bears must be climbing up on each other, because there are noses and teeth lined up all along the opening. 

“A whole stack of space bears,” Andra mutters.

The bears have been following them since they climbed out of the little two-man transport that brought them here. First it was just a glimpse of a paw, a snout sticking out from around a corner. Then it was a whole bear or two, still off in the distance but keeping pace. As they neared this crumbling building there were more bears coming in from all directions, getting closer, rounded furry shapes growing bigger in their lines of sight. 

And then suddenly, a howl from a hundred snouts and the bears were running toward them, leaping meters at a time, and Luke and Andra were scrambling through the main door and down a corridor and into this room, where they suddenly remembered that power doors become manual doors when the power’s been out for a hundred years. 

And power door locks don’t work, either.

Luke can picture the creatures stacked up now, outside the room, feet planted on each other’s backs, a whole neatly balanced pile of bears. He wonders how they decided who would be in the middle, and the thought of Serious Space Bear Negotiations makes him laugh.

“It’s not funny, Skywalker,” Andra says. 

“See? Isn’t this Jedi thing exciting? Aren’t you glad you came?”

“Most excitement I’ve had since the war,” Andra agrees dryly. “I hope we can still become One with the Force after they eat us.”

The door slides a little bit further open. Now it’s furry bear faces up to beady bear eyes, heads halfway through. The growling gets louder now that their mouths are free.

Andra eyes the lightsaber, still just an unlit hilt in Luke’s hand. “You going to be ready with that thing?”

“A lightsaber is a--”

“Defensive weapon, yeah, yeah,” Andra finishes for him. “You’re going to need some defense in about a Bendarian minute, Master Jedi.”

“That’s Jedi Master,” Luke answers absently, eyes suddenly half-closed as he catches a thought from--yes, it’s coming from the bears. 

And now that he’s opened himself up to the Force, there’s more he can feel here, too. They skidded in here so fast, they’ve been so focused on the furry mayhem out there, he barely noticed the artifacts in the room around them. Pedestals line the walls. Some of them are empty but many are lit by glowing cubes and orbs and diamond-shaped boxes that float a few centimeters above their smooth tops. 

Each of the boxes nudges at his consciousness, each one a different sort of tickle in his brain.

“Andra, do you sense the--”

“I sense the bears coming through the kriffing door!”

And so they are. They’ve pushed the door far enough open that Luke can see the stack of bears wobbling and then collapsing as bear after bear leaps forward, their bear friends crowding behind them and climbing over each other to get into the room.

Luke’s got the lightsaber blade lit the same instant that Andra fires.

The blade catches her blaster bolt and sends it careening over the furry heads.

Growls from a hundred snouts nearly drown out Andra’s shout. “The bears are that way, you Jedi idiot!”

Luke blocks her next blaster bolt too, and then shuts down the saber as he grabs her wrist. “You don’t need--” It’s all he gets out before the first bear knocks him down.

“Skywalker I am going to--” Two bears hit Andra’s legs at once and she’s down too, the words knocked out of her. 

As bear snouts and teeth close in on his face, Luke has about half a second to hope he’s not mistaken.

Andra’s laugh lets him know he guessed right.

“Holy-- hey! Luke, they’re--” 

But he’s too busy patting heads, scratching behind ears, fending off friendly licks from rough bear tongues. It’s a giant bear wrestling game. 

It takes a while but finally all the bears have gotten pats and tummy rubs and had a chance to play-fight the humans, and they’ve settled down, a hundred medium-sized piles of bear fluff around the room and in between the pedestals.

Andra’s lying on her back, staring up at the ceiling, a space bear curled up over her feet.

“Skywalker,” she says. “I swear my life was normal before I met you.”

Luke runs his fingers through the thick fur of the bear who’s fallen asleep with its head in his lap. “My life hasn’t been normal since I was nineteen years old.”

Andra sits up, sliding her feet carefully out from beneath the round, softly snoring hump. She looks around the room, at the glowing shapes still floating serenely above the pillars. “Those are holocrons, aren’t they?”

“I think so.”

“That’s what we came for?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, we better go check them out.”

The bears don’t stir as Luke and Andra load the holocrons into a soft carrying case, then tiptoe carefully back toward the door.

They both stop before leaving the room. 

Andra says it first. “We’ll just--”

“Yeah, before we--”

Half an hour later every bear’s gotten one last pat, and then they’re on their way back to the transport and heading home to Miriyan. They’ve got a school full of future Jedi to get back to, and a whole lot of work ahead.


End file.
